Tag Archives: broken arm

This post is not for the weak at heart. It will contain gruesome images of my skint (yep, and that’s how we SAY it down South!) knee and me moaning in pain on the floor! Don’t say you haven’t been warned.

My skint knee. It actually looked worse than it was!

One of the joys of having a high school student in the band is acting as band chaperone. For those who might not know (I didn’t), it’s exactly what you might expect—and so much more. It’s a combination chaperone and heavy metal band roadie!

The chaperone part is yeah—just watching them and making sure they don’t do things they’re not supposed to do; like slip off under the bleachers and start necking (oh come on—you’re not THAT far removed from high school that you don’t remember that!). The roadie part is moving stuff from here to there. Most of the heavy stuff is handled by the “equipment crew,” a bunch of dads who really just assist the students who do most of the grunt work themselves. Sometimes, though, chaperones have to kick in, particularly with our really large pit. No, not the race car pit, but the music kind (no, I didn’t know either): it consists mostly of xylophones, but there’s a full trap drum set, a gong, keyboards, and other such stuff. It’s not as easy to push that stuff through the grass/sand as you might think—I’ve done it.

This is what I’m talking about–how the coolers are loaded on a dolly…full of water!

Anyway, the whole point this blog is that at a recent competition I was lugging water around (it was terribly hot that day) on a dolly (heard some folks refer to it as a “hand cart,” but there’s not much “cart-y” about it!); two round containers FULL of water (meaning, heavy), lugged around on the dolly.

So I’d dragged this dolly to one place—it was the wrong place. I had to take it all the way back to where I had started. I hadn’t been there very long and it was time to go again. By this time, I’m beginning to get a bit tuckered out. As we head down a slight incline, I go to change the hand that’s pulling the cart (changing from right to left, but not sure that matters) and the cart begins to set up on me. Not a big deal, except it catches the back of my heel and I begin to fall forward…and bring the dolly with me, full water containers and all!

Immediately I felt more embarrassed than hurt, but it didn’t take long for me to realize blood was running down my leg and my arm hurt like crazy. They took me to first aid there at the competition where it was mostly band kids having issues with the heat (including Brett a little later). They looked at me, cleaned the knee a bit, and then suggested I get the arm x-rayed. I laid down in the floor while waiting to figure out how I’d get there (see the pic)…I’d ridden the bus with the band and didn’t have a vehicle.

Here I am, ice on my arm, trying my best not to moan!

A fellow chaperone had driven her vehicle and she took me and BJ to the local Urgent Care where they x-rayed my elbow to tell me it wasn’t broken and it was probably just a deep muscle bruise. But I’m telling you, it hurt like crazy.

In fact, I went to follow up with another x-ray on Wednesday (four days later) because I still had a lot of pain. Nope, still wasn’t broken; the doctor said it was probably just a deep bruise and—here it comes—I was old and didn’t heal as fast.

Three weeks later and my arm still experiences some pain if I move it the wrong way. I’m frequently being told by some of my more smart-mouthed friends “don’t move it that way, then.” Sometimes the pain is still sharp.

Byhalia Christian Writers pals

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About the picture

The picture at the top of my blog was taken while I was the editor at The Piggott Times, a small weekly newspaper in Piggott, Ark. You'll note on the bookshelves behind me at the bottom right, a "Chuck E Cheese" picture of me with my daughter, Brittany. Just to the left of that shelf, you'll notice my old Linguistics textbook--Dr. Foster would be proud. On the shelf above that, it is difficult to see, but an Arkansas Razorback "hog hat" sits proudly. It is one of the originals! On the shelf to the left of that is a book on Lincoln--I'm continually trying to enlighten folks as to the evils of this former U.S. President. You'll also notice the fan. The publisher was too cheap to spring for decent air conditioning, and in the hot summer months it was a literal sweatshop.